Saturday, December 27, 2008

In an interview, another former OLF leader shocked and destroyed the biggest propaganda schemes of the OLF and the TPLF separatist organizations.
Mr. Ababiya Abajobir was the former OLF External Relations director, the face of the Oromo Liberation Front (OLF) to the world for many years, before he finally gave up the tough job of misinforming the world and chose to expose the historical lies the OLF has been shoving down the ears and hearts of our Oromo people.

Groups like OLF and TPLF have been throwing the propaganda that Ethiopia colonized southern people and other groups which these separatists threatened to divide (secede) from Ethiopia. For many years, our Oromo people have been insulted by OLF supporters as “Neftenya” just because they challenged the propaganda of OLF. Oromos have been insulted by OLF just because we talked about Oromo heroes like Ras Gobena and Dejazmach Balcha, who united our country and made Ethiopia stronger while defending it from foreign aggression.
But today is the big day for all Oromos around the world who have been persecuted by OLF supporters because the former OLF leader himself has admitted what we have been saying for many years. Mr. Ababiya Abajobir admitted that Ras Gobena and Dejazmach Balcha were the Oromo-Ethiopian heroes who created modern Ethiopia. After many years of denial, this OLF leader admitted what our heroes like Emperor Haile Selassie told us for decades. Mr. Ababiya Abajobir admitted and said in an interview:

“Oromo nationality is a pillar of the country. So, we have to ask ourselves not only how a pillar can secede but also who created or cemented the unity? During the time of Menilik II, people like Dejazmatch Balcha and Ras Gobena Dachew expanded the territory through military actions and created the unity. Oromo people like others paid sacrifices in the battles of Adwa and Maichew.”

This is the second time a person from the highest level of OLF leadership has admitted historical realities which the OLF has been rejecting for almost 40 years. A few weeks ago, one of the OLF’s founders, Mr. Lencho Lata, shocked many OLF circles in the Diaspora by talking in favor of the Ethiopian state that the OLF propagandists hated deeply.

In addition to admitting the fact that the modern Ethiopian State was developed, created, expanded and united by brave Oromo-Ethiopians like Ras Gobena, the former OLF leader Mr. Ababiya Abajobir also said that some ancient Oromo communities like the Gibe Kingdom of Jimma shared the dreams of Ras Gobena and Menelik, which they showed by willingly uniting.

He admitted in the same interview by saying:

“In my birthplace, Gibe area, Aba Jifar consented to the idea of unity willingly and peacefully.”
At the end of the day, whether OLF leaders, founders or former leaders admit history does not make history truer because history can not be changed, added, subtracted or ignored. But the former OLF leaders and founders, Mr. Lencho Leta and Mr. Ababiya Abajobir, finally exposing the OLF 40 years old ideological propaganda is a symbolic victory to the millions of Oromos and other Ethiopians.

Sadly, these OLF leaders admitted history very late because thousands of Oromos around the world are already brainwashed to hate their mother country Ethiopia. Especially thousands of Oromos in the Diaspora, like in Europe and America, like in Minnesota, have been brainwashed to think that so-called “Abyssinians” colonized Oromos. Thousands of Oromos in the Diaspora are brainwashed to think in simplicity, in Black and White. But OLF leaders like Lencho Leta and Ababiya Abajobir are finally telling the truth and accepting historical facts, which will eventually bring victory to the truth and bring victory to the millions of Oromos who love their country Ethiopia.

The facts are, there was no single united entity “Abyssinia” that colonized Oromos because ancient Oromo leaders like Ras Gobena united Oromos and created modern Ethiopia, alongside other heroes like Menelik I. In those days when Oromo communities were divided as Gibe Kingdoms for instance ended up in civil wars and as some Oromo communities raided into Sidama communities; semetic speaking peoples were also divided between regions like Gondar, Gojjam, Wollo, Tigray, Shewa etc. In fact, there were various conflicts between these people, including the Gojjam King Teklehaimanot with his Oromo ally Ras Derasu whose armies fought against another Oromo leader Ras Gobena Dache and his Shewan Amhara allies. But the Shewans Ras Gobena and Negus Menelik easily defeated the Gojjam army and continued to unite the rest of Ethiopia. This battle between the Teklehaimanot-Deresu alliance against the Gobena-Menelik alliance was one of the biggest examples in Ethiopian history of a multi-ethnic alliance which exposes OLF’s propaganda of Oromo vs Amhara simplifications. Similarly, there were examples of infighting between Oromo speaking communities, one historic instance being the Oromo Kingdom of Limmu-Ennarea, which not only fought against other Oromo communities, but also created suffering for Oromo people due to the bloody internal power struggles. In fact, according to the historian Donald Levine, many ancient Oromo communities supported their Oromo hero Ras Gobena who united Ethiopians in every region and ended the “intertribal fighting” which was causing destruction and bloodshed as Oromos were fighting other Oromos. While Emperor Menelik (who spoke both Afaan Oromo and Amharic languages) was busy uniting northern Ethiopians, Ras Gobena (who was gaining more and more fame inside his Oromo communities) was uniting southern Ethiopians. Some historians even confirm that the Oromo Ras Gobena’s success was not limited inside his Oromo communities because Gobena also helped the southern people of Sidama and Gurage after he defeated rebellion forces of the Muslim Gurage warlord Hassen Injamo and united all southern Ethiopians.

It is important to remember that Ras Gobena and other Ethiopian heroes were very revolutionary and smart leaders who understood that Africans needed to unite for many reasons, including for solving their internal issues, to be able to defeat European aggressors and to be a powerful player globally. So it was not surprising that many smart Oromo leaders united with Amhara leaders and other Ethiopians to create a powerful Ethiopian state that defeated the better equipped European invaders like the Italians. In this sense, Menelik, Gobena and other Ethiopian heroes were foresighted African leaders who – in an era when the motto of the white race was that the black race was a “backward race” that is “less than human” with “no civilization, language or achievement” – stepped up to stop bloody inter-clan, intertribal fightings in order to create a multi-ethnic powerful black nation that we call Ethiopia. This reminds us that Gobena and other Oromo heroes and their allies like Menelik were revolutionaries who were ahead of their time and created a “united states” of African people while the western Europeans were developing their “united states” of America (albeit the incorporation of blacks across the Atlantic Ocean under slavery). So It is no wonder that historian Donald Levine confirmed the support Oromo heroes like Ras Gobena received when he concluded that the Gobena-Menelik mission of expanding, uniting Ethiopians and strengthening the country was “welcomed as a way to put an end” to the bloody Oromo vs Oromo wars of the century.

Even though Ras Gobena is one of the biggest Oromo heroes in Ethiopian history, there are many other Oromo heroes and famous Oromo leaders, including Fitawrari Geresu Duki, Dejazmach Balcha Safo, Dejazmach Jagama Kelo, Iyasu V, Fitawrari Abba Gomol, King Ali AbaJiffar and the famous head of Ethiopia’s Ministry of Defense Fitawrari Habte Giorgis (Dinagde) who ruled Ethiopia together with Emperor Menelik. Meanwhile, various Oromo entities like the Yejju Oromo Dynasty, ruled Ethiopia in different stages, while many other Ethiopian leaders were of mixed descent with ethnically mixed Oromo-Amhara or other ancestry – including the various Fitawraris and Emperors. Another historian Paul Henze also exposed the TPLF’s propaganda of pure ethnic identities by saying that
“pure Amhara can be found today only in isolated northern regions, such as Manz and Tegulet. All other Shoan Amhara have a sizable Oromo strain in their ancestry.” http://www.rand.org/pubs/reports/2006/R3347.pdf

This is the reason why today, millions of brave Ethiopians from Shewa and other Ethiopian regions have rejected Woyane’s ethnocentric census and refuse to simplify their complex historical identities by saying “Amhara” and “Oromo.” These failed TPLF classifications have ridiculed the ethnic politics agenda of separatists like TPLF and OLF, for these classifications indicate mere linguistic identities with no historical, cultural, religious, ancestral homogeny since a Wellega Oromo has very small non-linguistic similarity with a Shewan Oromo; nor does the multi-ethnic Shewans have a magical capability to claim they are pure one “ethnic” group. Therefore, Meles Zenawi’s current population statistics have been based on imposed tribalism, where an Ethiopian is forced to randomly choose one "ethnicity" that seems to be his/her most likely categorization and where the Ethiopian must blank out his/her memory and delete his/her unique, proud and complex history that led to the making of this multi-ethnic beautiful nation we call Ethiopia.

But simplification and propaganda is used not only by Meles Zenawi's TPLF dictatorship in Ethiopia today because the OLF is also equally experienced at this evil tactic. In fact, simplification and propaganda have become an accepted norm of the OLF organization that even one of the head ideological OLF “scholars” Mr. Asafa Jalata recently advised the OLF to increase the amount of its “propaganda” that is needed to “mobilize” the Oromo people who are suffering from “low level of the political consciousness,” according to this shameful OLF “scholar.” This is why our Oromo Diaspora communities need to confront OLF “scholars” like these who put down and demean the intelligence of our Oromo people who are beginning to think independently instead of having to parrot the OLF.

The last couple of decades, our Oromo people and fellow mixed Oromos have been attacked by OLF propagandists and labeled “Neftenya” for holding high the flag of Oromo heroes like Ras Gobena. The OLF used all its tools to make Oromos look at the world as “black & white,” in its simplest (though emotive) form, which brainwashed some innocent Oromo children to accept that these and these people are your enemies, and the OLF is your friend or your only “hope and shield” that will free you from “colonization” by non-Oromos. As the result, some Oromos have been forced to remain silent while the OLF propagandists claimed that Oromos were simply colonized by some type of Empire that was led by non-Oromos. But, the current admission by top former OLF figures like Lencho Leta and Ababiya Abajobir is the breakthrough Oromo people worldwide have been waiting for, to end the persecution of Oromos by the OLF mobs. The TPLF and the OLFs preying on innocent Oromos is coming to an end and the ideologically bankrupt Oromo separatists can not impose their will and propaganda on us anymore.